This week I have mostly been…wet. A little rain cannot dampen the spirits when embarking on an adventure like this, every hour or so when I’m cursing a drill bit flying into my finger or knocking the funny bone in the elbow so hard that the entire forearm goes numb, I do give myself a reality check: what else would I rather be doing? London seems a million miles away…
Note the precarious situations facing the platform builder:
This is just a very quick update to show you how far things have come along this week. I have had the pleasure of doing a giant jigsaw puzzle: the joy of recycling wood began to wear thin midweek and I contemplated visiting the local timber merchants for fresh 8’x4’ sheets of ply. At a cost of £20 per sheet, I realised the wood I had cost little more than a bit of extra work.
The platform went down in about 2 days, I could finally walk around my new digs and pretend where everything might go (cue extravagant gestures of ‘this will go here…and that there’). I have also noticed just how often I find myself talking out loud…to myself, I understand this is fairly common…I hope, but surely you are the person you have most in common with, so your bound to get on well with yourself, right?
Madness aside, I also jumped the gun once again and started building something that I would deem sort of unnecessary for the time being, actually, I felt that handrails were quite important and I’m sure you would agree!
The handrails I had in mind were not your bog standard design, being front of house and the first thing you see, they had to give an inkling of how the rest of the treehouse would turn out if given the attention it deserved. My Host tree is a damn fine example of the English Oak and I felt it only right to pay homage to that: scattered across the woodland floor were plenty of fallen oak limbs that I usually fed to Bertha, I decided to see if what I considered fuel, could be transformed into something quite different.
The limbs had reached an age where moss and lichen had well and truly made itself at home. To be able to whittle and sand these seemingly dead, yet rock solid limbs into something beautiful, reborn and recycled, would fit in with the flavour of the treehouse diaries. Sure enough after a bit of work, I had some gnarled and Y- shaped pieces of oak that was a bit like driftwood…see for yourself! As much as it pains me to say it, the concept was a little hippy- give dead wood new life. I think I’m spending too much time alone…
Looks more Amazon Jungle than Sussex woodland!
On the food front, never being one to pass up on a little free nosh, I couldn’t believe my luck when I came across a glut of roadkill the other day. If I had some sort of vehicle or a saw/knife on me then I could have dined on some venison later that night…so I learnt an invaluable lesson instead: chance doesn’t favour the unprepared mind.
Beautifully written and photographed, as ever! Loving watching your adventure unfold. Also lovin the new addition of the treehouse beats, who is it?
Posted by: Carrie | May 19, 2009 at 11:22 PM
Looking fab mate and very much looking forward to cycling down next week. lets pray for sunshine - what can I bring?
any chance of a wee book link on your books bit too - help those lagging sales.
adios x
Posted by: tom | May 20, 2009 at 11:04 AM
i can just imagine the looks from a passing motorist as they watch you disapear into the undegrowth, with the deer strapped to your back... the handrail looks like it grew there...
gary
Posted by: gary williams | May 21, 2009 at 12:16 AM